Reply #15: It depends on how you look at it, I think

[Mairead]

The 'power grab' was an attempt to get legislation past the reactionary SCOTUS of the time, which was blocking everything while the nation went down the drain--or toward socialism, which I'm sure seemed like much the same thing to Roosevelt et al. The SCOTUS was too hidebound and pro-wealthy to see the writing on the wall; eventually there would have been civil war, since if they weren't going to let even a hint of social-justice legislation get through, they clearly wouldn't have held still for a total peaceful repudiation of Capitalism. Eventually something (threats?) penetrated the heads of those numbskulls and some of them retired, breaking the logjam.